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Thread: How long does it take to become fluent in speaking, reading and writing Chinese?
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[quote=GUEST19376,372238]Hi Windenergy Wishing you well. Just posted for help re teaching baby mandarin. Wanted to share my german experience. Obviously different language &mandarin is FAR FAR more difficult, not just because of the script but also the tones. My posting may be too late, but may also help others. My background: I spent 5 years in high school learning german. Then I went to uni (no german) for 4 years. After uni, I did one single 12 week (one semester) uni course that was one half of the year that was supposed to bridge high school students who had done no german with those who had done 5 years german .... ie to be equivalent to 2.5 years of high school. I then went to german - and had trouble buying a bus ticket (forgot the words, had't learnt practical things, culture shock). When I arrived I could manage simple things - eg could understand and ask for most main grocery items - but couldn't decipher the detail on a can of food, just the main item. Sometimes I had to rely on the pictures on the can, because i didn't understand anything. I learnt a LOT of german from signs, supermarkets, radio, tv etc. For the first two years in Germany (I was there for four years) I gradually got better but still relaxed in english - with english books, tv (bbc was my friend) and occasionally driving 2 hours each way to reach the only english-language cinema in my region (most german movies are dubbed in german, and I could not understand them. Tried, a lot, and got better, but still didn't understand them). During these two years I had access for free to german language courses - I was teaching english in a language school in germany and so could attend for free the classes funded by government for foreign immigrants to learn german as a foreign language. These classes were 3 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 1.5 years while I was living in germany. (Govt funded classes stopped after a year but paid for more advanced tuition for another 6 mths). After 2 yrs, I was nowhere near fluent, but could manage most social situations - albeit haltingly and not very fluently and definitely not if technica language was involved. After my first two years, I found out that if I pretended i wanted to study at a german uni, I could access free language classes at the uni, preparatory to me enrolling in a masters degree. So I did that. After 6 months (again 3 hrs/day, 5 days/week) cont... [/quote]
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